hear that come out of your mouth.”
“Neither did I, Annie. Believe me.”
After another hug, and a promise to bring her boss that new pie the next morning, Val left, blinking in the bright spring sunshine flooding the small town square—the brainchild of some enterprising, and optimistic, soul from who knew how many decades before. The native pines and aspens held their own, of course, but the poor maples struggled to thrive at this altitude, and in fact had been replaced more than once over the years.
Which could also be said, Val supposed as she got in her car, parked at an angle in front of the diner, of the town’s inhabitants. Outsiders loved to visit but generally found the small town stifling. There were exceptions, of course—like plants, some nonnatives adapted better than others. AJ and Annie, for instance, had landed here as newlyweds and never left. And certainly not everyone born here stayed. But most did. Or found themselves pulled back, for whatever reason. Because apparently those roots were harder to kill than the aspens that cloaked the mountainsides in a blaze of molten glory every fall.
After picking up Josie from school a few blocks away, Val continued to her in-laws’ to get the baby, gratitude swelling for the hundredth time for Consuela Lopez’s insistence on watching her granddaughters whenever Val needed. Even groggy, cranky ones, she thought as, with a wail of displeasure, a sweaty Risa catapulted herself from her grandmother’s arms into Val’s.
Underneath a colorful tunic, Connie’s bosom jiggled when she laughed. “Honestly, reynita...your mama will think I’ve been pinching you!”
Shushing her screaming “little queen”—not that it worked—Val smiled. Soft and round and all about the hugs, the redhead-by-choice wouldn’t have pinched an ant if it was crawling on her, let alone her adored—and only—grandchildren.
“She must’ve gotten too hot. It was chilly when she went down for her nap, so I put a sweater on her. But it warmed so quickly this afternoon! If I wanted hot, I’d live in Cruces!” Her mother-in-law shuddered, the typical reaction of most northern New Mexicans to the thought of living in Las Cruces, three hundred miles to the south near the Mexican border and a good twenty degrees warmer than Whispering Pines. After being stationed in the Bowels of Hell, Texas, Val could relate. “Josie,” Connie now said, “go see what’s out on the porch with Gramma Lita! But just look, don’t touch, okay?”
At Val’s raised eyebrows after her daughter scampered off, Connie sighed. “A mother cat and her kittens. Pete found them in the Dumpster behind the store. Can you imagine? Two babies, a tuxedo and a gray tabby. Almost weaned, I’m guessing. Adorable.” Then she got that look. “I don’t suppose...?”
“Forget it. The dog would think I’d brought him a snack.”
“Aww, Radar’s such a sweetie—”
“No.”
Connie shrugged, then tromped over to the fridge for one of the baby’s squeezie applesauce things. “There you go, sweetie... So I hear Levi Talbot’s working over at the house?”
“Jeez, Connie—” Val readjusted the schlurping Two-Ton Tessie against her hip, then glared at her mother-in-law. “A breath between thoughts would be nice.”
“Can’t waste time. Josie could return at any second.”
“Between Angelita and the kittens? I’ll be lucky if I see her again before she’s twenty. And yeah. Levi’s back. But how did you know?”
“He came over last night. To catch up. To talk about the house.”
“He was here?” Val’s mouth tightened. “And you didn’t think to give me a heads-up?”
Connie took a deep breath, and Val braced herself. Six months on they both might have had more of a handle on the waterworks, but the spigots weren’t rusted shut by any means. And now, when Val saw her mother-in-law’s eyes glisten, her own stung in response. Then the older woman sighed.
“Look... I know you had your issues with Levi,” Connie said gently, then blew a short laugh through her nose. “Heaven knows, so did we. From time to time, anyway. The Talbots are good people, and were good parents, but Levi...”
“You don’t have to tell me,” Val said, hoping to hell she wasn’t blushing. “Believe me.”
“So we didn’t understand, when Tomas took up with him, of all people. But you know what? Levi was the most loyal friend Tommy ever had. Sure, the boys pulled some boneheaded stunts—and even Tomas admitted that Levi spearheaded every one of them—but as heart-stopping as those stunts were, they also broke Tommy out of his shell. So all I’m saying is...be kind to Levi—”
“Mama! Look!” Josie ran into the kitchen, a squeaking black-and-white furball clutched to her chest, a pleading look in her eyes Val knew she was gonna have a helluva time resisting. She’d seen the same look in Tommy’s eyes when he brought home Radar.
The same look but different—oh, so different—she’d seen in Levi’s eyes the day before. That morning. The I need something from you look. And to ignore that look, to pretend it didn’t affect her, only made her a big old meanie, didn’t it?
Clearly, the entire world was conspiring against her.
* * *
“Look what I got, Levi!”
About to nail the last new plank on the porch floor, Levi glanced over to see Josie flying toward him, a loudly mewing something—not a skunk, then—cradled under her neck. And Radar, who’d been snoozing in the grass, surged to his feet to investigate the New Thing that had invaded his territory.
“Josie! Oh, jeez... No! Wait!” Val shrieked from the driveway as she tried to get the baby out of her car seat. “We need to introduce them slowly!”
Levi bolted down the steps before the child was traumatized for life. But even as he went to grab the dog’s collar he noticed Radar’s wagging tail...and that he’d plopped himself down in the gravel at Josie’s feet to awoo! awoo! at the kitten, now clutched even more tightly in a wide-eyed, clearly terrified, Josie’s arms. Levi crouched beside the dog, curling his fingers around the collar, anyway.
“He just wants to be friends,” Levi said gently, his gut twisting at how much the little girl looked like her daddy. “Why don’t you let him sniff the kitty? It’s okay, I’ve got him.”
“You sure?”
“We had cats and dogs all the time when I was growing up on the ranch where my daddy worked. They’re not natural enemies, no matter what people think. I promise—I won’t let anything bad happen.”
Josie shot him a look that rattled him as much as it warmed him. To be truthful, Levi was pretty much clueless about kids. Yeah, he was an uncle three times over, but he hardly knew his nephews, having been away for the better part of the past six years. And girls? They might as well be a whole different species.
So it made his heart swell when the kid sucked in a breath, nodded, then carefully lowered the kitty so the nutso dog could check him, or her, out. At the sound of gravel crunching, Levi glanced up to see Val with the baby, clearly holding her breath. And yet, if she’d let Josie have the kitten, deep down she must’ve believed it’d work out, right?
That,
